Low density PolarFire FPGAs reduce static power consumption
Microchip reports that it’s low-density PolarFire devices consume half the static power of alternatives despite providing the world’s smallest thermal footprint.
Edge compute systems need compact programmable devices, with robust compute performance but also with low power consumption and a small thermal footprint to eliminate fans and other means to mitigate heat. Microchip says it has solved this challenge by halving static power consumption for its mid-bandwidth FPGAs and FPGA SoCs. It also says they have the smallest thermal footprint and best performance and compute horsepower compared to all alternative devices in their class.
The PolarFire FPGAs and FPGA SoCs reduce system costs while enabling customers to solve difficult thermal management challenges without having to forfeit bandwidth, explained Bruce Weyer, vice president of Microchip’s FPGA business unit. “The award-winning PolarFire FPGA platform already delivered the industry’s best combination of power and performance, and now we have reduced power consumption by up to 50 per cent or more with the introduction of lower density offerings, while maintaining best-in-class capabilities on these platforms,” he said.
The MPF050T FPGAs and MPFS025T SoCs exceed the performance / power metrics of any low density FPGA or SoC FPGA alternatives available. They also have fast FPGA fabric and signal processing capabilities, transceivers and the industry’s only hardened application class RISC-V architecture-based processor complex with 2Mbytes of L2 cache and low power DDR4 (LPDDR4) memory support.
According to Microchip, extending the portfolio with a 25k logic elements multi-core RISC-V SoC and a 50k logic elements FPGA opens new application possibilities. They can be used for low power smart embedded vision applications and thermally constrained automotive, industrial automation, communications, defence and IoT systems where neither power nor performance can be compromised.
The PolarFire devices are complemented by a suite of Microchip devices for complete systems solutions for applications including smart embedded vision, machine learning, security, aerospace and defence, and embedded compute. They also provide plug-and-play solutions for power and timing designs.
Developers can begin designing with Microchip’s PolarFire FPGAs and FPGA SoCs now using its recently released Libero 2021.2 software tools. Volume shipment of production silicon is scheduled for the first calendar quarter of 2022.
